7 Tips for Creating a Social Media Strategy

If you did hear us loud and clear at RE/MAX Kick Start 2014, NOW is the time to start incorporating social into your everyday marketing, branding and planning. Real Estate is part of the full-fledged digital world, which means social media should be a part of your overall strategy, not a separate entity.

Here are 7 tips for Creating a Social Media Strategy:

1. Define your overall goal?

There are a few questions you will need to ask yourself. What is your purpose with social and how are you optimizing it for your business? Is it a monthly or a weekly goal? Is it a combination of increased number of links and a specific number of posts? Is it testimonials? Is it home renovation? What is your story and how will digital help you? Define clear, attainable goals and understand them so that you can feel the accomplishment of them.

2. Plan Ahead: Content Calendar

Image c/o: www.vapartners.ca

When we hear that agents are neglecting social media, it is most often because they feel there is not enough time in the day. Making time is important and it is much easier to do when you’ve planned ahead. Take an afternoon at the end of every month to plan out what you’re going to blog, tweet and share. It can be around an overall monthly theme that includes community events and holidays as well as any other important events or information you would like to share. Print out a calendar and map out what you’d like to share and talk about over the next month. Just like you book appointments, and attend events, make sure to add those to your calendar. Planning ahead makes it much easier to anticipate how much time you’ll be dedicating.

3. Create Fans

How is your strategy creating positive buzz about you? What are people saying about you online, and how is it affecting your brand? What are you doing to engage with your clients so that when they talk about you and say positive things? All of these are good questions to ask yourself that can help you strengthen your online presence.

4. Be True To You

Everyone is unique in their own way. We are all passionate about something different and we all have different interests and different experiences. How are you leveraging your unique SELF? Outside of your Real Estate knowledge and expertise, what else do you bring to the table? What is something people know and or love about you? Are you using this in your digital and personal branding

5. Analytics

Are you tracking what’s working and what’s not? Have you looked at Facebook Analytic’s? Do you use Hootsuite reports? Observe which topics are driving traffic to your website, and what is getting the most views. By taking a look at your analytics, you will be able to see if what you are doing is working or not. Once you see what you are doing well, you can continue to do similar things. It works the same way for the things you are not doing as well so you will know what not to include in your next post.

Image c/o: interactive-media-arts.ca

6. Is this sustainable for the long term?

There are so many new platforms and tools being released that it’s hard to keep up. You hear all the time that you need to be on all social platforms; you need be found everywhere online. That’s true if you believe you’ll stay up to date on all accounts and if you understand each one and their advantages. Otherwise, don’t try to jump on all platforms, all the time. Start with where your audience is. Master the art of one social network. Master your strategy, your planning, and your content. Then prepare to incorporate another. You’re building your digital brand and you want it to be long lasting like your career.

7. Keep Posting.

So, you have started on this digital journey and have set up your Facebook business page and uploaded your photo. You have put out a status and invited a few clients to “like” your page. Now you may be asking yourself, “what next?”. You want to stay top of mind and consistent; therefore, you need to keep your posts relevant and daily and try to include content that your audience is responding to.